A Systematic Review of Features Forecasting Patient Arrival Numbers

Adequate nurse staffing is crucial for quality healthcare, necessitating accurate predictions of patient arrival rates. These forecasts can be determined using supervised machine learning methods. Optimization of machine learning methods is largely about minimizing the prediction error. Existing models primarily utilize data such as historical patient visits, seasonal trends, holidays, and calendars. However, it is unclear what other features reduce the prediction error. Our systematic literature review identifies studies that use supervised machine learning to predict patient arrival numbers using nontemporal features, which are features not based on time or dates. We scrutinized 26 284 studies, eventually focusing on 27 relevant ones. These studies highlight three main feature groups: weather data, internet search and usage data, and data on (social) interaction of groups. Internet data and social interaction data appear particularly promising, with some studies reporting reduced errors by up to 33%. Although weather data are frequently used, its utility is less clear. Other potential data sources, including smartphone and social media data, remain largely unexplored. One reason for this might be potential data privacy challenges. In summary, although patient arrival prediction has become more important in recent years, there are still many questions and opportunities for future research on the features used in this area.